Front Row Seats
by emrys-knight
Summary: A known enemy of the Chicago PD kidnaps Jay and suffering ensues.
1. Chapter 1

It was not unusual for the members of the Intelligence Unit to strike up a friendly conversation before shift. They'd sit in the bullpen sharing a laugh or two, until it was time to get to work. On this particular day, two of their members were noticeably absent.

"Ten bucks says they're still in bed." Adam laughed. The team laughed.

"You're gonna lose twenty for that comment." Voight said. Suddenly, everyone straightened up and the giggles were gone. "Where are they, really?"

"Don't know. They're not in yet." Alvin piped up. He took a sip of his coffee.

"Somebody find them. The rest of you-" Voight was stopped by Erin walking into the room. "Where the hell have you been? Where's Halstead?"

"I've been looking for him... He hasn't come in?" She asked.

"Uh, no?" Adam said holding his arms out, rotating his hips to gesture for her to look around.

"He didn't come home last night." Lindsay started to think about what could have happened. She sat at her desk and the phone went off. It was from downstairs.

Next to the staircase stood a pizza boy with a box. The team walked towards him and he handed them the box and walked out. Voight opened it to see a thumb drive next to a note. "Take a look." They ran up the stairs to see what was on the drive.

"Your little cop man is here with us. Pretty, _pretty_ boy. I think I'm gonna keep him. Maybe play with him a little bit?" A feminine voice said from behind the camera. Her voice was playful and terrifying. It was like Harley Quinn but at a slightly lower tone.

In the camera's focus was Jay laying shirtless, chained to the floor. The only thing keeping him warm was his jeans but they were soaking wet. He was bloody and cut up, with small slashes all over his arms and torso. His groans echoed off the mossy brick walls and wet concrete floor.

"Pretty boy thought he would take my drugs from me, didn't he? He was wrong." The voice continued. It was if she was baby talking a puppy. She picked the camera up and walked towards Jay. He was too weak to move. He'd obviously been drugged. She zoomed in on his face and kicked him in the stomach. He let out a cry of pain and curled up as much as he could. She continued kicking. When she stopped, he coughed a few times and groaned.

Adam paused the all looked around to each other as if someone was going to say something that made seeing what they were easier. They looked back to the computer and it began again.

"You think you can just send in some _cop_ and have him seduce me and take my drugs? My money maker? My _income_? I don't _think_ so." She said. She set the camera back on the stand and showed her face. Selena Raker.

Again, Adam paused the video. "Who's that?" He asked, looking at Voight.

"Selena Raker. She's got a long sheet, man. She's obsessive: over men, drugs, art, and whatever she can get her hands on. Two years before Jay went undercover with her drug ring, she had discovered the effects drugs had on people. She created her empire. Jay went undercover while you were in the hospital with Burgess. Looks like she found out about it." Hank answered. Suddenly, an alert came onto the computer and Adam clicked on it. It was a live feed to see what Selena was doing to Jay.

She had him chained up with his hands above his head. He was hanging from the ceiling and so weak, he couldn't even stand. His wrists were bleeding from the large, rusted metal cuffs she had on him. She had cut his jeans to a point where they were like ribbons hanging from his belt line.

"You coppers want to see what happens to people when they mess with my business?" She asked. "This!" She hit him in the ribs with a crowbar as hard as she could. When she was done, she threw it to the side of the room. The sound echoed loudly. She hoped it'd have the effect on the unit that she wanted. It did.

She walked towards the right wall. There was a big crank like the ones on manual car windows attached to the wall and she started to push on it. Jay slowly lowered down to the ground. She made her way back over to him and took a rag out from the back pocket of her leather pants and put it over his face. He tried to fight it, but he was so weak from the blood loss and all of the pain he was in that he just couldn't. She pulled the bucket of water over towards them and began pouring the liquid onto the rag. He coughed and struggled while she kept on pouring. Finally after a few seconds, she set the bucket down and removed the rag to let him expel the water from his body.

"Just… do it." Jay was barely able to speak. "Kill me. If you're that… mad." The team started getting glass-eyed.

"Oh, no, baby. I would never _kill_ you." Raker said. She started to stroke his arm. He tried to crawl away but he'd only made an inch of ground. "What is it, my love?" She was genuinely hurt. Confused, even.

"No." Was the only thing he could force out. He was starting to pass out, again. He was almost happy. He'd be asleep and unable to know what was happening; escape for a little while. Though, he was terrified for not being able to know what he was going to wake up to.

"What?" She asked angrily. She grabbed a piece of glass from under the wall crank and started to cut him on his shoulder. He let out a small cry of pain. " _What_?"

"I-I said… no." Jay started. He passed out and she started screaming. She suddenly whipped her head around to look into the camera. The rage-filled look in her eyes terrified the team.

"You're not getting him back. He's mine, now. Keep the damn drugs. I can make more. But I can't get another man like this one." She sat next to him and stroked his arm as he lay unconscious.

"We gotta get him back." Erin said. Tears were streaming down her face at this point. "That bitch thinks she loves him!" She looked towards the screen. With every stroke Selena made, Lindsay got angrier.

"I know." Voight said. "Mouse can you get a location on Halstead and Raker?"

"No." Mouse said. "She's got the signals bouncing around the world at a rate that I just can't track."

" _Dammit_." Adam said, slamming his hand on his desk. "I knew he was burned but he told me he wasn't. He said he _knew_ he wasn't. We should have ended it. Gotten him out."

"That's on Jay, not you. Right now, this is on _us_." Erin said. She grabbed her gun off her desk and holstered it. "Now let's get Jay back." The phone rang once again. Erin picked it up and it was Platt.

"We got a paper down here that I'm sending up." Platt said. She hung up and right as she did, an officer walked through the door and handed it to Hank.

"What is it?" Adam asked.

"A map." Voight answered. He stuck it up on the board and everyone started to study it. "A big circle over Chicago." In the top corner of the page, off of the map, was two letters,"SRJH".

"Selena Raker, Jay Halstead." Adam said. He looked to the rest of the team for a response.

"I don't get it." Alvin said.

"She wants to keep Jay but she also wants to tease us. She wants the rush of us getting close and her getting away." Voight said.

"Then what do we do?" Adam asked.

"Find her ass." Erin said, angrily. She looked back to the screen and saw Selena give Jay a light kiss on the cheek and look back at the camera with a smirk. The rage built up inside of her and she balled her fists. "That little…"

Selena then stood up and walked towards the camera. She bent down and blew a kiss at the camera, winked, then turned the stream off. Voight hugged Lindsay as she was being attacked by her emotions. Anger and grief all at the same time jostling around in her head fighting to be number one. While Jay suffered, so did the rest of the team.


	2. Chapter 2

***3 days later***

"Dammit!" Erin yelled. She pushed the white board down to the ground, her emotions getting the better of her.

"I think I've got something!" Mouse yelled as he ran into the room, spying the downed white board yet choosing to ignore it. "She owns a boat at the harbor! She may try to take him there. It's sort of unexpected. Not for me, though."

"Right, pat yourself on the back while we wait for an address and boat name," Alvin said disapprovingly.

"Sorry. It's the northshore harbor and the boat is called Monet." Mouse said sheepishly. "Probably a play on 'money'." He sat down just as the team rose to leave.

"Let's get that bitch," Erin said, determined. "And let's get Jay back."

"Wakey, wakey, my pretty." Selina crooned, the creepy, sing-song tone of her words sending chills down Jay's spine. As his awareness grew , he found that he had been handcuffed to a chair in the middle of a room. He appeared to be on some kind of boat, water visible outside a few large windows to his left. He was wearing all new clothes, including a white, short sleeved t-shirt, and new black jeans with rips on the knees. 'Great. She undressed me,' he thought. He was only mildly infuriated until he realized…

He had new underwear on, too. She had gotten him completely naked and then re-dressed him. Jay couldn't help but shiver at the thought of what she might have done, or even _thought_ of doing to him, while he had been unconscious. He looked up and met Selina's amused gaze. He finally decided to speak.

"Wh-where are we?" He scanned the room quickly. They were on a boat, that much was obvious, but the questions was, _where?_ Chicago had miles and miles of coastline. How was his team ever going to rescue him?

"We're on my boat!" Selina said in a menacingly cheerful way. "We're gonna get lost at sea. Where they will _never_ find us."

"You're crazy. You know that?" Jay spat. The drugs had worn off and he finally felt like he was in his complete right mind. Problem was, that _right mind_ was what was going to get him in trouble because it was connected to his _smart mouth_.

"I'm not crazy!" Selina yelled. She pulled a knife from her pocket and held it up to Jay's neck, right against his carotid.

"No. No. You're right. You're a lunatic!" Jay regretted the comment immediately. Selina drew the knife away from his neck, and slapped him hard across the face. She paced the room for a moment before speaking.

"Stop that!" She yelled. "Say I'm not crazy!"

"You need your prisoner's validation?" He asked. 'I'm seeing a recurring theme of regret happening, here.' He thought. She paced the room for a moment, muttering to herself and becoming increasingly agitated with each passing second. She finally let out a blood-curdling scream and stabbed him in the shoulder with her knife. Luckily, it was small, but it still hurt like a son of a bitch. He cried out in pain and struggled against his restraints. He yelped when his movements jarred the knife still sticking out of his shoulder.

"I don't want to hurt you, baby, but you can't say mean things like that to me! It makes me feel bad!" She yelled. "You can't be mean to me!" She yanked the knife out of his shoulder and started stabbing at his stomach. His pristine white t-shirt was quickly becoming saturated with blood. She seemed to be making a conscious effort not to hit any vital organs, though. She wanted him alive, but in pain.

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry… babe?" He tried. She stopped in her fit of rage and looked into his eyes.

"Did you just call me babe?" She started. "You love me, now?" She dropped the knife and it clattered to the ground.

"I do. And if you let me go, I can go buy a ring right now and we'll get married right here on the boat," he said. He was losing blood fast and his mind was beginning to shut down. Its only focus was on surviving this ordeal. He would have said anything.

"No! No, no, no!" She screamed suddenly. "You don't love me! You just want me to let you go! You want to leave me!" She scooped the knife back up from the floor and quickly walked behind him, grabbing his hair and holding the knife to his neck yet again. Jay was losing consciousness; a small pool of blood had formed under his chair. He could feel himself drifting away, but as the darkness crept in around him, he thought he could hear someone calling his name. It was a familiar voice. Not Selina's hysterical one, but one he had heard so many times before. It was a voice that promised safety and rescue. But that was impossible. His team wasn't coming. He was going to die here on this boat.

"Jay!" Erin screamed as she peered through the windows of the boat and saw what Selina was doing to her partner. "Hold on, Jay!"

"Shoot her!" Voight yelled. But no one took the shot. Selina was crouched behind Jay, using him as a human shield. There would be no way of getting her without hitting him, too.

"Put your guns down or I'll kill him!" Selena yelled out, her words audible, even through the glass.

"No. You won't do that." Adam said. "You can't." He put his gun back in his holster and put his hands up.

"Oh I can't, can I?" She asked. She nicked Jay's neck and a drop of blood slowly snaked down his neck.

"You love him. You can't hurt the people you love," Ruzek said. He took small steps toward the window. The rest of the team remained in their gun-drawn positions, tensions high.

"What are you doing?" Voight whispered. "You're gonna get him killed!"

"Look at him," Ruzek continued, ignoring his sergeant and continuing forward. "He needs help. You don't want to lose him, do you?" The team finally understood what he was doing. Selina looked at Jay. She saw how much he was suffering and she was truly starting to hear what Adam was saying.

"Is he gonna be okay?" Selina asked, standing up and looking concerned. She dropped her weapon and raised her hands, crying hysterically. "Is he gonna be okay?"

Ruzek holstered his gun to get to Selina to handcuff her. Suddenly, a gunshot rang out and a loud thud was heard and felt across the vessel.

"What the Hell?" Voight asked. He turned around to see Erin's face. A look of rage, yet satisfaction, playing across her features. She holstered her gun and pushed the team out of the way to get to her fiance. The team moved forward quickly, eager to get to Jay and secure the scene.

"Jay? Jay wake up," she tried. She pushed Selina's body to the side and quickly undid Jay's restraints. When she got him out, Alvin helped her pick him up and move him over to the couch in the large room.

"E-er-erin." Jay managed to mumble before his eyes rolled into the back of his head and he went limp. Lindsey started crying.

"The ambulance is here," Burgess announced, ducking her head into the room. The team collectively picked Jay up from the couch and brought him to the dock where a gurney was waiting. As they rolled him away, the paramedics threw around a bunch of medical terms none of the detectives understood, putting an oxygen mask over Jay's face. Erin jumped into the back of the rig, ignoring the annoyed look one of the paramedics gave her, and they sped off towards the hospital.

"BP's dropping," the paramedic said a short time later. She was working on his wounds, trying hard to stop the bleeding. She almost had it. _Almost._

"You better not die," Erin said, searching for Jay's hand and finally finding it. She held it tightly in her own. "If you do, I'm gonna be pissed."


	3. Chapter 3

***two weeks later***

The light in the room is moderately shining through the blinds. It's a cold day in Chicago, with a slight drizzling snow. The sun remains warm on Jay's face as he sleeps. The apartment is quiet and peaceful, yet filled with a dark and deep feeling. Erin sat, awake, looking over to her still-injured fiance. She watched his chest rise and fall rhythmically. She looked at his wounds. They were starting to heal and had mild scarring but remained moderately unhealed.

His eyes slowly open, showing the contrasting brighter and deeper blues in his irises. When he fully wakes up, he looks over to Erin, who sinks further into the covers, gently wrapping her arm around his chest. He gives her a light kiss on the forehead and lays his head back onto his pillow with a sigh.

"How're you feeling?" Erin asked. Her warm breath rolled across his bare chest, creating a calming feeling that came over him.

"Pretty good, all things considered," Jay answered. He looked downward at his stomach, with a slight frown. "I just wish I could go back to work."

"And wear that vest over your wounds," Erin laughed. "Seems like it'd hurt." She smiled, gaining eye contact once again. She saw Jay's emotions on his face change.

"Don't call it that," Jay said. "Don't call them ' _wounds_ ' _._ "

"I'm-I'm sorry," Erin said. "What should I call them?" She sat up, watching him sit at the edge of the bed.

"I don't know," He answered. He stood up, slowly. She gained a look of confusion for a moment. She picked her book back up and began reading, again, still kind of fazed by how Jay was acting. She then heard a loud thud. She ripped the covers off of her body and ran into the living room to see Jay in fetal position on the cold hardwood floors. He was shivering.

"Jay, talk to me," Erin said to him. She checked his pulse. It was erratic. He slightly opened his eyes to see the fear in her face.

"It's internal bleeding," Jay said, voice shaky. He let out a cry of pain. Erin ran and got her phone, dialing 911.

"This is detective Erin Lindsay. Badge number 61317. I have an officer down! In need immediate assistance at apartment 5C on Burrows and Lanchester. He says he has internal bleeding. Get over here now!" She screamed. She hung up and threw her phone back on the bed and ran back to Jay.

"I'll be okay," Jay said. He could see how scared she was. He grabbed her hand and held it firmly. When she felt the pressure instantly release as he fell unconscious, the panic started to set in.

"Jay? Jay!" She let go of his hand and grabbed his shoulders, shaking his body. She ran to grab their go-bags. She set them down by the door and quickly made her way back to Jay. She grabbed his hand, once again. "Come on, come on." She thought about how slow the ambulance was.

"Jay," Will said, watching as his baby brother was rolled into his ER for the second time in two weeks. He began feeling the same thing he had the first time. The fear, the incoming irrational thoughts and decisions. How much was his brother going to suffer? When was he gonna get a break, and dammit, that oxygen mask looks like it should be a little bit further up on his face. Something about his IV is wrong. He doesn't know what it is but something about it just seems wrong. His thoughts were interrupted by a loud, authoritative voice.

"Baghdad! He's crashing," Connor said. They quickly got Jay into the room and began working.

"Jay," Will said, once more, quickly walking towards the room. Ethan rushed over to stop him from getting inside to his brother.

"You know you can't," Ethan said. Will continued to try and push through but he couldn't. Nurses were rushing over to help Dr. Choi. "Listen to me, Will."

"He needs me. I can help him!" Will yelled. " _I can help him!"_

"And so can every other doctor here," Ethan said. "He's _still_ in good hands. You would know."

Will pushed his friend away and stormed down the hall mumbling indecipherable things under his breath. He pushed equipment off of tables and violently rolled gurneys that once sat against the wall out into the open hall.

The hospital room is dark. The lights from the adjacent buildings bring in a sort of artificial moonlight. The night is cold but the room is warm. Jay lays under several blankets, hooked up to multiple machines. The erratic beeping of the EKG wakes Erin up. She stands, moving away from the recliner she was sleeping in. Jay groans and whimpers in his sleep. She watches as a single tear falls down his right cheek. When Erin grabs his arm and attempts to wake him up, he grabs her wrist firmly, pulling his fist back. She tries to get her wrist from his hand, as it is causing her pain.

" _Jay_. Jay it's me," She said. He saw her face and quickly released his grip. She pulled her arm close to her chest and began holding her wrist with her other hand. She looked over to the other chair to see that they hadn't woken Will up.

"I-I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you,"Jay said.

"What happened?" She asked.

"I'm fine. It was just a bad dream," He said.

"I've seen you when it's 'just a bad dream' and I've seen you when it's a PTSD dream. _That_ was a PTSD dream," Erin said.

"Stop. Stop _saying_ that," Jay said.

"Stop saying what?" She asked.

"That acronym." Jay said, getting more and more frustrated. The drugs were partially to blame for his misplaced anger but what he'd already had in his head for a while and what he'd just gone through played a major role in the fact.

"PTSD? Jay, lots of people suffer from it. Lot's of _vets_ and _cops_ suffer from it," Erin explained.

"Do you know what each letter stands for? You know what the D means? Disorder. I guess I'm just some disorder, right? I'm messed up. My head isn't right. I might snap at some point, right," Jay went on.

"Jay," Erin said.

"Just let me sleep," He said. He turned over and closed his eyes, thinking about how much he hated what he just did. Erin sat down in the recliner and thought about everything that had just happened, and what had happened over the past few weeks.

Will was slightly awake, though pretending as if he wasn't, hearing everything that had just happened. He was on the verge of tears.

***3 weeks later***

"Look who's back," Adam said with a large grin. "What, you run out of vacation days?"

"Yeah. But I was willing to use them all up 'cus your mom had a great time," Jay teased.

"Still sharp," Erin said. She gave Jay a quick kiss on the cheek before walking into Voight's office and closing the door.

"Hey." Voight said. He leaned back in his chair and looked up to her.

"Jay's PTSD has been coming up more, recently, and I just thought you should know," Erin said.

"Keep an eye on him, then," Voight said. He started to leave the room before Erin said something that shocked him.

"Bench him."

"What?" He asked.

"I said bench him." Erin said, crossing her arms.

"I can't," Voight said. "Physically, he's good enough to be back. Mentally and emotionally, there's really no way to justify what you're asking me to do."

"You can't? What do you mean? You've faced more than policies of letting detectives in the field," Erin said in an angry tone. "You can _absolutely_ bench him. You have to."

"You're right. What I meant was: I won't," Voight started. "Another thing I should have said was that I don't want to. He's fine. Look at him." The two looked out of the room to see Jay laughing and smiling, while talking to Antonio and Ruzek.

"Voight," Erin said.

"Let it go," Voight said. When he did, four well-dressed men walked into the room with a well-dressed woman walking between them. Voight and Erin walked out of the room. "The Hell?"

"Detective Erin Lindsay," The woman said. The four men walked towards her and handcuffed her hands behind her back. "You are under arrest for the murder of Selena Raker."

"Explain to me who you are what you think you're doing," Voight said, voice stern.

"My name is Carrie Hall. We're from IA. Your detective, here, killed someone. People go to jail for breaking laws like that, sargent," She said. "Don't worry. She'll get a fair trial. It's the law, anyway." The four men walked out of the room with Erin and Carrie followed.

"She was saving my life," Jay said. "That's why she shot her."

"She shot her _after_ Selena had stepped away from you and dropped her weapon." Alvin said. "To them, that doesn't count."

"Can you fix this?" Antonio asked, looking to Voight. He didn't reply. He stood in complete silence and pure anger, watching as they took his little girl, handcuffed and scared. IA had no idea what kind of war they just started. But they'd figure it out, soon.


	4. Chapter 4

"Come on," Jay said. He crossed his arms, and stared Voight right in the eyes. "She was just trying to stop that crazy lady from friggin stabbing me again!"

"I'm not saying I don't agree with you but IA has a different thing in mind," Voight said.

"We'll get her out of this," Jay said, defiantly.

"Not 'we'. You're off the case," Voight said, walking to his chair to sit.

"Woah, you can't just bench me, man," Jay said, taking a step towards the desk.

"I can and I did, and if you don't like it, then I really don't care, Halstead," Hank said, leaning back in his seat.

"Please. Please don't do this. I gotta help her," Jay said, sitting down in one of the seats in front of the sergeant's desk.

"And you will. Be there for her outside of the case, other than that, don't go near it, you understand me?" Voight crossed his arms, looking Jay directly in the eye.

"But I…" Jay tried. The look in Voight's eye solicited a tail-under-the-legs response from baby Halstead. "Yeah."

"Yeah, what?" Voight pressed.

"I understand," Jay answered.

"You understand what? I want you to say it, Halstead," Voight said, now leaning towards Jay.

"I'm off the case," Jay said through gritted teeth. He couldn't help but be emotional about Erin. And Hank knew that.

"This is bullshit! The bitch was killing Jay!" Erin said to Alvin, pacing in Voight's living room.

"We know that, but it doesn't matter to them," Alvin said, watching her as she stepped back and forth throughout the room.

"You need to get some sleep. You can either stay here or go home. That's up to you, but get some sleep, you hear me?" Voight insisted. Erin nodded as he put his hands on her shoulders, making eye contact with her. She sighed.

"Yeah." She walked into the kitchen and grabbed her keys off the table before giving Hank and Alvin a hug. She left the house, intent on getting in bed and curling up against her beautiful, mostly-healed man. Alvin gave Voight a nod before leaving, himself, knowing what he was about to do.

"Come on, you're saying that state-of-the-art camera on your yacht doesn't work?" Jay asked the young man.

"Sort of. I'm actually saying it doesn't work until you have a warrant," The man said, stepping onto his boat.

"Man, I'm not asking for whatever illegal thing you're doing, I'm just asking for the tapes from a very specific time on a very specific day," Jay tried.

"Well I'm asking for a nonspecific warrant from a very nonspecific judge," The guy said. Jay balled his fists and the guy ran.

"The hell?" Jay asked himself before booking it after the guy. Now he wouldn't need the warrant, at least. Probable cause for the win. Problem was, Jay was tired and had just gotten off of bed rest and still moderately wounded. With every few feet, he could feel his last few stitches tearing, but he had to get this guy. He had to know why he'd run in the first place.

"What's your deal, man?!" The guy asked.

"You're the one who ran!" Jay yelled back. He suddenly felt all of the stitchest tear and looked down, still running, to see the blood seeping through his light army-green shirt. He was out of breath and honestly felt that it wasn't worth chasing the guy anymore. He slowed his pace until fully stopping, putting his hands on his knees, panting, his lungs greedily pulling in every bit of oxygen they could.

When he managed to slow his heartrate and his breaths came in more evenly, he heard his phone ring.

"Halstead," He greeted.

"You gonna meet me at Molly's? We gotta celebrate!" Erin said.

"Wait what?" Jay asked.

"Voight pulled some strings and I got off!" She cheered.

"G-good! Gah," Jay groaned.

"Hey, what's wrong?" Erin asked.

"Nothing. I tore my stitches. I'll go to med real quick and then head to Molly's." Jay heard Erin sigh, dramatically, and agree.

"Forget Molly's. I've got something at home… that's… laying on the bed next to the box…" Erin teased.

"Maybe I won't make it to Med?" Jay joked.

"If you don't, it goes back in the box." Erin cautioned.

"Right. I'll tell them to hurry." Jay said, laughing. Damn, he was excited.


End file.
